Saw him win in Montreal last year, based on that I had him pegged as a stage hunter rather than a GC candidate in grand tours. Think he might win more week long tours, but most likely he'll crave a hilly classic.

i was going to wait for his performance on wednesday to bump this thread but since it has already been done . . . . .

he said he was sick after the TdS and wasn't feeling great at the start of the tourn mostly after his crash on stage 1, but now he says he is feeling better and better as the race progresses and since piti has lost too much time he will be riding for himself from now on. he actually waited for piti on saturday so ended up losing a bit more time then he should have, but that climb suited him unlike the high mountains.

A top 10 surely is within his grasp, with his TT and Valverde's assistance even more, the time gaps up until now are irrelevant if riders dont climb well in the high mountains proper and that will surely assist Costa's GC ambitions.

so now that the tour is over i would like the bump this thread once again.

Costa still finished 18th on GC despite only caring about stage wins ever since the first "real" mountain stage of the tour to la toussine.

he was on the break on the last 2 mountain stages so he clearly has the recovery, but just like he has always done, he still struggles on the real climbs losing too much time.

imo he should focus on the classics and 1 week races for now and if he really wants to, try to see what he can do on a GT in a couple years when he is more mature and his abilities are closer to their best.

I think he has good recovery but he should go either one way or the other.

1st Option. Go for stage wins at GT's one week races and classics.

2nd Option. Abandon the 1st option and try become a GC rider. That for the moment would however be a bad view in my mind as he can still achieve good results in other races.

If he does try a GT for GC soon i think it should be the Vuelta ( even though Movistar have Valverde and Cobo for that and in the future Madrazo and Quintana ), because with one climb he can conserve energy then give his all/ have a good ITT over some other contenders.

For the rest of the year i can foresee him getting a good result at the WC- best of luck.

He seems perfectly comfortable and integrated where he is. He's been getting his chances too. I think the risk of changing to a new outfit (especially one like Greenedge) outweights the advantages.

Those adavantages would be more freedom/leadership of course. If Ardennes are a serious goal for him, then there lies the question mark. At Liége being at Movistar beside Valverde was not of benefit for him.

Great ride by Costa today, looks like he's peaking just at the right time. Agree with max, I can see Movistar providing strong competition for Sky at the Tour. Quintana, Rui, and Valverde will be a strong triple.

Agree that he should stay with Movistar also, he's had a lot of success with them. And with Valverde not getting any younger he'll get plenty of opportunities to lead at the races he wants to target.